Homeless Initiative awarded $51.5 million to assist 105 Freeway and river encampments

California has awarded Los Angeles County’s Homeless Initiative a $51.5-million grant aimed at helping homeless people along the 105 Freeway and nearby riverbeds access housing and services over the next three years.

The county announced that its Pathway Home encampment program will use the grant money to move close to 600 people into interim and permanent housing. Additionally, the program will continue to assist the nearly 600 currently housed since its launch in August 2023.

It aims to target one of the largest clusters of camps in the county, stretching from West Athens to Norwalk.

L.A. County collaborated with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) and Encampment Resolution Funds (ERF) when applying for funding.

“The people of L.A. County want to see progress,” county Supervisor Janice Hahn said in a release. “This is the kind of strategy we need to double down on, and with this new state funding, we will be able to bring hundreds of people inside who have been living in sprawling encampments along the 105 Freeway.”

LAHSA and L.A. County have been leveraging the county’s emergency declaration to address the homelessness crisis through interventions like Pathway Home, according to LAHSA CEO Va Lecia Adams Kellum.

Combined with $16 million in existing Measure H and local sources, the Homeless Initiative plans to conduct Pathway Home operations, focusing on the unhoused people living in tents, makeshift shelters and RVs in the area where the 105 intersects with the Los Angeles and San Gabriel rivers.

“This money, along with the collaboration we are seeing at the local level, is essential to the continued success of L.A. County’s Pathway Home program,” county Supervisor Holly Mitchell said in the April release. “We are removing more disabled RVs and, most importantly, urgently working to provide housing and stability to our neighbors experiencing homelessness.”

The program will use the funds to secure interim housing, such as motel rooms, and to master lease permanent housing. It will also cover rental subsidies, housing navigation, case management, life skills development and other services.

Since its introduction in August, Pathway Home has helped 562 participants move into interim housing and 95 into permanent housing, according to the county. The program has also removed 302 RVs from public roadways.

Several communities will be affected, including West Athens, Willowbrook, Downey, Norwalk, South Gate, Lynwood, Santa Fe Springs and South Los Angeles, including the areas surrounding several L.A. Metro stations.

A spokesperson for the Homeless Initiative stated that the county is currently developing a timeline for operations.